Why are you writing?

[Emi_the_Fairy]

I think framing writing as something specifically for your audience is kind of a poor framing. Writing while considering your audience is good of course, but centering it on them? eh.

I write for me. I write to get my ideas out there and put stories out there that I would've liked to see as a kid and that I'd like to see more of now. Stories that focus on emotion and grapple with big ideas like grief. They're ideas I want to share. Writing is a form of communication, and I want to communicate the things I love and care about to others, and both me as an author and the audience are big factors in that communication.

 

[Xeoz]

Boredom. Got nothing to read, so I asked myself a question. Why not write my own novel?

 

[SpiraSpira]

I’d say writing for me always was about me. It started out day dreaming/fantasizing when I was a kid about various things. I always read a lot, even as a child, and often I would in my brain “steal” a story’s hook and then try to imagine my own story as it would diverge from the beginnings of an established story. The first story I remember doing this to in any large way was the Magician books by Raymond E. Feist which I read when I was like 11 or 12. I didn’t have the concept of fan-fiction at the time.

Eventually it got to the point where the stories I was imagining were too complicated to solely remain in my head and still enjoy them so I got the idea to write them down. While I’d rather people enjoy what I write than not it honestly doesn’t make that much difference so long as I enjoy it.

I’m definitely not doing this with aspirations to become a professional writer, I already make fairly good money in my career but it is a career that has a lot of down-time, sometimes (I am an air ambulance pilot that just sits around for twelve hours a day at work waiting for people to get sick, which sometimes doesn’t happen.) So it has become more of a way to kill time for me, especially when I don’t have anything to read, myself.

 

[SakeVision]

I just had some deep thoughts about it.

Until now, I was writing to make my stories like a complex and beautiful gameboard of chess, where each character is a piece and each player does optimal moves.
Such gameboard would be both thought-provoking and interesting, though not necessairly entertaining in the shallow sense of the world.

Because if humans want to get merely entertained, they should go watch some flash Hollywood movie where explosions go bang bang or maybe sniff a couple of lines of cocaine every day like I used to do. There's your dopamine rush and happiness, and you don't need to put effort into anything complicated like reading a novel to feel happy and content with life.

However, now I think, that merely creating a gameboard isn't enough. Now a certain ambition is born within my heart, I think I want to create a gameboard that's capable of touching humans on a deeper and emotional level, just like my favorite fictions did to me. Not merely be thought-provoking, which is superficial, but also go deeper to the depth of a person's soul.

The only reason I didn't attempt it until now, is because I was humble and didn't think such a brain-damaged and ruined person as myself can attempt such a colossal task and succeed.
But you can never know until you try.

 

[trinitys_gadget]

I had some silly ideas about dragons, some controversial ideas about pets, and kind of wrote the first few chapters on a lark while world-building with another author. Then my characters wouldn't let me be. Now I'm trying to link all their disconnected little vinnettes into a cohesive tale. Hopefully, somebody else will be as entertained as I am.

And it sounds like Megumi needs a hug.

 

[LadyIsak]

Honestly? I can't imagine not writing. I write because I like to tell stories, and because I enjoy a) coming up with stories b) the actual work of developing stories and writing prose and editing and whatever c) when people read things I wrote and have opinons on it.

I don't particularly know what else I'd do with myself if I wasn't writing.

 

[OliviaMyriad]

I write because I like it when other read my stuff. My motivation directly and positively correlates to the popularity of my works (and when I get stressed out from reader feedback, the correlation is negative)

 

[TheHelpfulFawn]

I write because I have a story that I want to share.